


The Storm Before the Calm

by elephantine



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-11-22
Updated: 2013-01-16
Packaged: 2017-11-19 06:15:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/570110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elephantine/pseuds/elephantine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This short story takes place after the events of "X-Men: First Class." Here, Charles Xavier encounters a mutant unlike any other and attempts to recruit her to join his newly formed X-Men, but Ororo's trauma renders her powers so unstable, she is a danger to herself and to others.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

_It’s remarkable really. She’s another person altogether from when I found her eight months ago. Terrified and angry. Traumatized and confused. But look at her now...a true goddess of the elements. Marvelous in her awesome force but utterly humble in her humanity._

********************

EIGHT MONTHS AGO

“What is your name?”

She didn’t answer.

“Don’t be afraid. I won’t hurt you.”

Still no reply.

The dust and chaos of Cairo’s streets surrounded them. Noise and commotion bustled to and from every direction in an incoherent flurry of life so common to this ancient capital.

He sat in his wheelchair in the middle of the bazaar. Moira stood patiently behind him, her hands resting on the handles.

He was glad she was with him. Just days after he wiped her memory, he not only felt in violation of his own ethical and moral standards, but he realized what a useful friend and ally in the CIA she could be. Also, and more than any other reason, he found that he couldn’t wipe her from his own mind...So he recruited her again and gave her back the memories he’d erased. It took her weeks to forgive him, but in the end she did, because she knew she felt something she couldn’t shake those few days she was robbed of those memories with him.

She wondered if they looked odd not moving when all around them everyone and everything else was in constant motion. She could tell he was in contact, even though when she looked in the direction he was concentrating, there was no one there.

“He can detect mutants without Cerebro now...” she thought to herself.

“Only when they’re close enough,” he replied, and she couldn’t help but smile from behind him.

Down an alley about twenty yards away was a mutant huddled against a wall with her head cupped between her hands. It wasn’t the first time someone communicated with her telepathically, but the only other person who ever entered her mind was her kawwad, or pimp.

“She’s too frightened Moira, and I can’t press too much. This one’s different.”

“You always say ‘this one’s different.’”

“Yes, well, this one’s really different. She’s in desperate need of help.”

“You always say that, too,” she teased him.

Normally he’d have a witty comeback ready to fire, but the fact that he didn’t made Moira quickly realize the gravity of the situation. Her grip tightened on the handles of his chair.

“Let me try one more time...”

As he reached out to the mutant again, he felt a pressure that wasn’t there before. It was unlike any sensation he’d ever felt. There was an enormous amount of emotional energy ready to burst in such violent force that he didn’t realize how tightly he, too, was gripping the arms of his chair.

“I’ve never encountered this mix of emotional and...my god, meteorological, yes, meteorological agony before,” he thought to himself.

A strong and sudden breeze swept through the bazaar. Dust and sand swirled in quick agitation, and vendors scrambled to shield their goods from the unexpected change in weather. Women found their hair scandalously exposed when their scarves blew off-balance, allowing men nearby the rare and forbidden glance at a woman’s full head of hair. A herd of goats scurried in the confusion, their bells and neighs becoming extra cacophonous as the shepherd tried exhaustively to keep them together.

The sky began to darken and Moira looked up to see clouds rapidly forming in a clockwise direction. She knew this wasn’t an act of nature. Not only do weather patterns like these not occur in Cairo, let alone at this time of year, but the clockwise rotation, indicating the formation of a tornado funnel, is characteristic of tornadoes from the southern hemisphere of the globe. Egypt lies within the northern hemisphere...The urgency of what was happening struck her.

“Charles!” she called to him.

He was still in a deep lock with the unseen mutant, captivated by the electric sensation he’d never before experienced when probing another mind. So tangible was the feeling that the hairs stood on the back of his neck. He quickly found himself and returned to the real and imminent threat of the situation. He gave one last attempt at reaching out to her.

“Listen to me...something’s happening here that I can sense is of a very destructive capacity, and I’m not sure you’re aware of that. Please, let me help you. My name is Charles Xav...”

Thunder cracked in deafening volume and lightning struck a palm tree just several yards away.

Charles cut the connection.

“Moira we have to get out of here now,” but when he regained full awareness of the present, he realized he wasn’t where they were just moments ago, and moving at a fast pace. Moira was already pushing his chair, running away from the marketplace. He leaned from the side and turned his head to see what had happened.

The palm tree was split into two. One half laid smoking across the street, having crushed a fruit vendor’s cart, pomegranate seeds strewn about as though the tree bled pebbled rivers of blood. The other half still stood tall with its foliage set ablaze, fed by the howling wind.

To his disbelief, the funnel of a massive tornado was making its way downward from the blackened sky. The infrastructure of Cairo’s streets were in no way suited to withstand such sheer and brutal force. Anything in its path stood no chance.

He wished he had the ability to mentally connect with all the people in the vicinity of danger and make them flee. A Cerebro that could locate all humans instead of mutants, though he somehow felt that could be a seriously dangerous tool should it ever get into the wrong hands.

Moira had taken them up an old stone paved street that sloped upward, just out of reach of the tornado’s destruction. They turned and stopped there, looking at the unreal scene of the climatic Armageddon. Homes were broken, trees uprooted, debris swirled in the air, and people ran in sheer chaos, searching for cover.

The sky was blue as far as the eyes could see in every direction leading away from the bazaar. It was just the isolated formation of dark clouds with a single massive funnel touching the ground that ravaged the small radius of a few blocks below.

He tried to locate the mutant once more, but all he could sense was a cerebral mass of dark and thick clouds, speckled by angry flashes of light, neural pulses mirrored by the flashes of lightning in the sky. He knew she was hidden in those clouds somewhere. So he sat there and waited. Waited for the storm to pass.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Now at Xavier's mansion, Ororo struggles to get adjusted to her new home. Charles delves into her past to understand her trauma and unlock memories that play a vital role in her healing.

_After defeating the Shadowking, the mutant pimp who took over her mind, we convinced Ororo to leave the streets of Cairo and come with us, despite being incredibly unstable. So much so, that I had to keep her asleep, effectively sedated, for the flight back to New York. Otherwise, she may have brought the plane down with one of her storm outbursts. There was certainly some unexpected turbulence. And....for reasons unbeknownst to me at the time, she was inexplicably terrified at the thought of boarding a plane, more than the common level of flight anxiety. Turns out you can’t blame her for harboring those fears..._

********************

FIVE MONTHS AGO

It’s been several weeks since Ororo’s arrival at the mansion. Coping with her new surroundings while still peering over her shoulder in fear of her pimp proved to be more difficult than anyone anticipated. She kept to herself for the most part. Charles was the only one she would talk to, and even then, it was only through telepathy. A strange desire to connect with the familiar despite her only experience with telepathy being with the Shadowking, the one person she’s always tried to escape.

It was a brisk fall morning. Throughout the mansion, students carried sullen expressions to match the prolonged gloom of the skies. Sean and Hank were in the kitchen, holding steaming cups of freshly brewed coffee. Hank switched the TV on for the morning news. The weather report was running, announcing a forecast of overcast clouds once again for the area. It had been that way for a couple of weeks now. When Ororo first arrived, unseasonably heavy rainstorms plagued the area for several days, but as Charles was able to slowly calm her down, the weather stabilized to the now endless gloom of overcast skies. Meteorologists were left utterly stumped at the odd and inexplicable behavior in the weather.

“If this keeps up, the weather reports are going to start looking suspicious,” said Hank. With raised eyebrows and a shrug of his shoulders, Sean's  expression suggested he agreed, but that there was nothing they could do about it.  "It's up to the Professor to fix it," he said.

In a room located on the second floor of the mansion’s west wing, Ororo and Charles sat in seemingly total silence. She was propped against the headboard of the bed, her knees up to her chest, still underneath the blanket, creating a tent of silk sheets that reflected what little light came in through the tall windows. Her eyes were slightly illuminated, coated in a milky white. Charles was rolled up to the foot of her bed, his hands together and resting on his lap.

“Tell me about your life before Egypt,” he said without saying.

“It’s...difficult to remember...” she thought back. “Everytime I try...” she shuddered and beads of sweat began to form across her forehead. She swallowed and continued, “Everytime I try...I feel as though I’m being suffocated...like...walls closing in.” She wiped the sweat away with the back of her hand then wrapped her arms around herself.

“Ororo, with your permission, I would like to probe your mind,” said Charles telepathically as he extended his arm onto the bed.

She looked at him through the hazy glow of her eyes.

“You see, I have a philosophy here. No mutant should ever use his or her ability to harm another person, or without their consent, and I am no exception to that rule. You can trust that I will never intrude on your mind or invade your privacy. I can promise you that Ororo.”

“You are in my mind right now, aren’t you?” she asked him, aloud.

“My ability allows me to touch another’s mind in different capacities. We were communicating telepathically, yes, but I was not reading your mind. However, I may be able to help you unlock some of your memories, if you’ll allow me to try,” he responded, also out loud.

“Then...yes...you have my permission.”

He swept his hair back and leaned forward in his chair, his elbows on his knees, hands interlaced in front of him, and said, “Just try to relax.”

Ororo closed her eyes, and the light from them flickered out.

It was quickly evident to him that her mind had been taken hostage for quite some time by the Shadowking. Like a hallway full of doors, many of them were bolted shut, memories hidden and locked away from their very owner.

“He’s indeed a master of mental manipulation...” he thought to himself. “By taking away certain memories, he removes key parts of his victims’ identities, leaving them lost and confused. This is how they come to rely on him, trapped in the vicious cycle of codependency that exists between a pimp and his...employees.”

One by one, he began to unlock doors so tightly locked, and memories resurfaced like seedlings sprouting from the soil. Ororo winced, her forehead wrinkling, as she gripped the silk sheets tightly.

_He was standing in an open plane, gloriously typical of Kenya’s landscape. “Standing...” he thought to himself in a momentary distraction from disbelief. A soft wind danced across the wide expanse, creating waves among the sea of gold as the yellow grass bent and swayed, reflecting the sun’s light. Behind him were the warm sounds of a happy village. Preparations for a ceremony were underway as villagers set up decorative poles laced with exotic flowers in an array of vibrant colors. Young men carried a large tarp made of what was clearly the village’s finest fabrics to interlace across the poles and create a canopy that would shield from the bright sun. Groups of women were seated in circles and moving in a rhythmic pattern of dough kneading effortlessly synced to the beat of the folk song they were singing. A group of children ran through the village, weaving in and out of huts, almost knocking over a large bowl of grain. One of the dough kneading women cried out in anger after them. He noticed that among them was a child who stood out from the rest. She had platinum hair, as bright as the teeth that shone through her wide grin. She deviated from the herd for a quick embrace of her mother’s arms who was standing nearby, conversing with a man not native to the village. He was holding a large camera and wearing a vest with many pockets, each seemingly filled with items that no doubt were intended towards his photography. He snapped a quick shot of the little girl and her mother before she energetically scurried off to rejoin the other children. He was her father._

The wrinkles in her forehead smoothed away and a calmer expression took over her face. Even the very beginnings of a smile began to form.

_Suddenly he was in a seated position again. Across the aisle to his left were the platinum haired girl and her parents, except she now appeared to be an adolescent. He noticed they were shielding her, tears streaming down the mother’s face while the father held them in his arms. The chaos of the scene quickly became apparent. All around him, people were in similar positions. Some were clutching the seat handles, some reciting prayers out loud, others simply screaming and sobbing, even the cry of an infant could be heard, shrill and alarming in its response to the calamity. He felt the undefeatable pull of gravity grow stronger and realized all that was keeping him in place was the seat belt strapped across his waist. The extreme turbulence flung open the overhead compartments and bags pummeled their way down, attacking anyone and anything in their path while at the same time a cart whizzed past him leaving behind a trail of spilt beverages and cups rolling forward as though chasing after it. The plane was crashing, and he braced himself for impact._

Her heart rate quickened as her breathing became louder. Beads of sweat glistened on her face, chest, and arms.

_It was dark and he could barely move. Thin traces of light beamed through small cracks and openings in the rubble. He shifted his arm slightly, but it triggered an avalanche of debris to tumble over him, causing dust to float around. He coughed from how difficult it was to breathe, both from the pressure of rocks against his chest, squeezing his lungs, and the floating dust. His head was turned to the side, and through an opening between jagged concrete slabs, he could see and smell smoke. Scraps of metal bent and twisted in violent fashion were strewn about. The sounds of shouts and screams filtered through from above him, mixed with wailing sirens and the roaring sound of flames from the motor of a large engine still desperately clinging to life as it hummed and gurgled in defiance. Strands of hair rested across his face, and he thought to himself, “my hair’s not that long...” Then he realized that nor is his hair white. His shirt was torn exposing his shoulder which was covered in blood, but he could still see the dark complexion of his skin, or rather, her skin. He was experiencing the trauma of being trapped beneath the rubble as she experienced it. The plane must have crashed into what was clearly an inhabited area, striking several buildings in its way, including the one beneath which he was trapped. This must certainly mean that the number of casualties exceeded the plane’s passengers, but where were they? He focused on the voices he could hear from above and made out Arabic both from the cries of the injured and the emergency crew. He could hear them working their way through the wreckage when suddenly the weight on his chest and legs seemed to double. They must have shifted something that shouldn’t have been moved. Sheer panic took over him as her terror became his. The walls were closing in and he screamed for his life. He screamed and screamed and..._

He jolted, screaming in his chair, gripping the handles and taking in large, deep breaths, filling his lungs with the air he so desperately needed when beneath the rubble. Ororo was convulsing in her bed, twisting the sheets and whimpering for help. Tears were streaming through closed eyes, wetting her pillow which was already moist with sweat.

Through the windows he could see flashes of lightning followed by deep and slow rumbles of thunder, as if the clouds felt her pain and suffering.

He wheeled his chair up to get closer and grabbed her shoulders, trying to wake her.

“Ororo! Ororo it’s all right. It’s all right you’re safe. It’s just a memory!”

She bolted upright with eyes wide open, swiveling her head from one direction to the next. Slowly she remembered where she was and the rumbling outside quieted. She put her hand to her chest which was heaving up and down and looked at Charles through teary eyes.

“It’s been so long...so long since I recounted these memories. My mother and father...they are dead. They died in the crash. They are dead. I will never see them again. And then...I was trapped...so trapped, buried alive!”

“I’m so very sorry...Perhaps I shouldn’t have dug so deep. I had no idea how painful this would be.”

“No...I should be thanking you. I can remember who I am and where I came from. I remember my mother and father. That is worth everything to me. He...took that away from me. I felt so lost all this time. Thank you Charles.”

“Ororo, there is something you must understand about your ability. Through your emotions, you’re somehow connected to the elements, particularly the weather. When you’re agitated, it’s reflected in the weather, and at times, that can be dangerous. You have a beautiful gift, but it comes at a cost. This is a very difficult time for you, but somehow, you need to find the strength to control your emotions, thereby controlling your influence on the weather.”

“How can I do that?” she asked in an exasperated tone.

He placed his hand on hers, smiled, and said, “I don’t know, but I will help you.”

Some moments went by in silence. Then, looking down at their hands, she smiled back at him and said, “It’s a good thing this is a very large room.” He realized it was the first time he’d seen her smile since finding her in Cairo. “I’m afraid of small spaces...” she said, her voice trailing off.

“This used to be the room of an old friend of mine. You two would have liked each other. Whenever it rained, he used to stand at that window, open it, and hold out a metal rod, like a fool, hoping lightning would strike.”

“But that is dangerous!” she gasped.

“Oh not for him. He had his abilities, too, and he liked to test them,” said Charles looking out that window.

“What happened to him?” she asked.

“Irreconcilable differences I’m afraid,” he said turning back to her, “but not to worry, I’m ever hopeful we’ll remain good friends. Well, I think all this work calls for some tea don’t you?”

She suddenly became aware of how famished she felt and said, “Tea would be wonderful, and what are those biscuits so popular here...Or...Ar...Orpeols? I’ll have some of those, too.”

“An unorthodox pairing, but tea and Oreos it is,” he said with a smile.

She got out of bed and as the two of them left the room, Charles noticed their shadows beating them to the door, growing longer by the flooding of bright light from the sun. He turned towards the tall windows and smiled at the clear blue skies.


End file.
